I had 27,000 miles on United that expired a short while ago, and they offer a deal to reinstate them for a price. I can spend $50 to get 25,000 miles back, and I’ve just took a recent trip to DC and have a Feb trip to Switzerland coming up, plus some possible work travel in the works including back to India so it’s unlikely they’ll expire soon if I get them back.
Is it worth buying back those 25,000 miles for an occasional upgrade or future flight?
That totally depends on if you are going to use them.
25k points will get you a round trip economy class ticket on United, and you can’t find a flight for only $50. On the other hand, you obviously don’t use the points, or they wouldn’t have expired in the first place.
I’ve used points for flights several times in the past, this is the first time I’ve lost any substantial amount. It’s getting harder to use them for vacation flights, but I can use them for upgrades on business travel.
In that case I’d go ahead and buy the points back, since it sounds like you have some uses coming up for them in the near future.